The Commentariat -- May 2, 2016
Afternoon Update:
Voter Suppression Laws Work the Way They're Supposed to. Michael Wines & Manny Fernandez of the New York Times: "As the general election nears -- in which new or strengthened voter ID laws will be in place in Texas and 14 other states for the first time in a presidential election -- recent academic research indicates that the requirements restrict turnout and disproportionately affect voting by minorities. The laws are also ... reshaping how many campaigns are run -- with candidates not only spending time to secure votes, but also time to ensure those votes can be cast." -- CW
Charles Pierce writes about what Donald Trump means to his supporters & suggests Trump doesn't get that. CW: It sure gave me that old fascist feeling. ...
... AND, tho Pierce had something nice to say about Chuck Todd, I guess he missed the segment Driftglass illuminates. It sounds like one of those teevee-smashing moments, especially when you realize that folks out in the Heartland are nodding along with the Muzak. -- CW
E.J. Dionne: "... a phony celebrity populism plays well on television at a time when politics and governing are regularly trashed by those who claim both as their calling. Politicians who don't want to play their assigned roles make it easy for a role-player to look like the real thing and for a billionaire who flies around on his own plane to look like a populist." -- CW
A Vote for anyone other than Cruz is evil. ABC News: "Urging voters to pick him over ... Donald Trump..., Ted Cruz framed the battle to win the Indiana primary as a choice between good and evil. 'I believe in the people of the Hoosier state. I believe that the men and women gathered here and the goodness of the American people, that we will not give into evil but we will remember who we are and we will stand for our values,' Cruz said at a rally in La Porte, Indiana"-- Akhilleus
*****
Seung Min Kim of Politico: "Senate Republicans have left town for another recess with their yearlong claim that the Senate is 'back to work' an increasingly tough sell to voters.... But the chamber is on pace to work the fewest days in 60 years, the party continues to insist it won't act on President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nomination, and Republicans' ballyhooed strategy to shepherd all dozen spending bills through the chamber is in serious trouble." -- CW
Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "... it appears the absence of [Justice Antonin] Scalia will be felt on the court's work next term.... The court has accepted only six cases since Scalia died Feb. 13. The number is low compared with the average, Scotusblog.com editor Amy Howe said at an event last week reviewing the Supreme Court's work. And none of the cases that the court has accepted for the term that begins in October approach the level of controversy that have marked the dramatic rulings of recent years." -- CW
John Pfaff, in a New York Times op-ed: "... despite this constitutional guarantee [of a government-appointed lawyer for criminal defendants who cannot afford one], state and county spending on lawyers for the poor amounts to only $2.3 billion -- barely 1 percent of the more than $200 billion governments spend annually on criminal justice. Worse, since 1995, real spending on indigent defense has fallen, by 2 percent, even as the number of felony cases has risen by approximately 40 percent." -- CW
** Ezra Klein & Dylan Matthews of Vox: "The joke of President Barack Obama's performance on Saturday was that he wasn't joking." -- CW
Julie Davis & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "Malia Obama, the older daughter of President Obama, plans to attend Harvard University beginning in the fall of 2017, the White House announced on Sunday, waiting until her father leaves office to begin her college career." -- CW ...
... Gap Year. Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "Malia Obama's decision to take a year off before attending Harvard University in the fall of 2017 reflects a growing trend among high-achieving teenagers to pursue other interests and get a respite from the academic grind that has come to define high school for many young Americans. But it will also provide her with a chance to experience college as the glare of the presidential spotlight has begun to ease...." -- CW
Presidential Race
Yamiche Alcindor of the New York Times: "Bernie Sanders said on Sunday that he and Hillary Clinton were heading to a 'contested' convention this summer because she will need superdelegates to secure the nomination, a claim that clashes with the accepted definition of a contested convention.... Mr. Sanders urged superdelegates in states that he has won and those who came out in support of Mrs. Clinton before he declared his candidacy to switch their support to him." -- CW
John Wagner of the Washington Post: "Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders said he raised $25.8 million in April, well shy of his eye-popping totals of recent months. The figure comes as Sanders's chance of defeating Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination have dwindled, with his loss to her in the New York primary on April 19 widely viewed as a turning point in the race." -- CW
Scammer-in-Chief. Ken Vogel & Isaac Arnsdorf of Politico: "In the days before Hillary Clinton launched an unprecedented big-money fundraising vehicle with state parties last summer, she vowed 'to rebuild our party from the ground up.'... But less than 1 percent of the $61 million raised by that effort has stayed in the state parties' coffers, according to a Politico analysis.... The venture, the Hillary Victory Fund, is a so-called joint fundraising committee comprised of Clinton's presidential campaign, the Democratic National Committee and 32 state party committees. The set-up allows Clinton to solicit checks of $350,000 or more from her super-rich supporters at extravagant fundraisers.... Most of the $23.3 million spent ... has gone towards expenses that appear to have directly benefited Clinton's campaign...." CW: As I've written before, this is a scam, yet journalists who should know better unwittingly claim that Clinton is helping the party while Sanders is not. Clinton controls who gets what, & it turns out who gets what is mostly Clinton.
Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Just hours after the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against a new Indiana abortion law, Hillary Clinton stumped miles away from the state capitol and filed a sort of amicus brief. 'I will defend a woman's right to make her own health-care decisions,' Clinton said to a few hundred supporters packed into a sweltering recreation center. 'I'll tell ya, I'll defend Planned Parenthood against these attacks. And I commend the women of this state, young and old, for standing up against this governor and this legislature.'" -- CW
Mark Hensch of the Hill: "... Donald Trump on Monday said that CNN's news coverage favors ... Hillary Clinton. 'They do call it "the Clinton network,"' he told Chris Cuomo on the network's 'New Day' after the host questioned his blunt campaign rhetoric. Trump said that his recent remarks attacking Clinton's gender and China's currency manipulation are not controversial." -- CW
Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump and Hillary Clinton threw some practice jabs in interviews broadcast on Sunday, signaling a general election that could focus heavily on Mrs. Clinton's gender and on her more hawkish foreign policy. 'The only card she has is the women's card,' Mr. Trump said, continuing to contend that Mrs. Clinton would not have won more than five percent of Democratic primary votes if she were a man.... Mrs. Clinton said she planned to ignore Mr. Trump's 'bullying' and 'temper tantrums' and focus on issues if they face off in the general election." --CW
Brittny Mejia, et al., of the Los Angeles Times: "Thousands of people took to the streets in the annual May Day marches in downtown Los Angeles and Boyle Heights on Sunday to advocate for immigration reform, police accountability and an end to racism. The diverse array of protesters shared one thing in common: all were offended by something Donald Trump had said. The Republican presidential candidate literally loomed over one of the rallies in the form of a giant balloon effigy carrying a Ku Klux Klan hood. 'He's plastic, he doesn't have a heart, he doesn't have a brain,' organizer Francisco Moreno said...." -- CW
Bienvenidos, Cubanos! Patricia Mazzai of the Miami Herald: "Donald Trump is the catalyst who could force a decisive break between Miami-Dade County's influential Cuban-American voters and the Republican Party, a new poll has found. Local Cuban Americans dislike Trump so much -- and are increasingly so accepting of renewed U.S.-Cuba ties pushed by Democratic President Barack Obama -- that Trump's likely presidential nomination might accentuate the voters' political shift away from the GOP, according to the survey shared with the Miami Herald and conducted by Dario Moreno, a Coral Gables pollster...." -- CW BUT, see also Beyond the Beltway. Not every Cuban-American is, um, on board.
Shane Goldmacher of Politico: "Donald Trump won the New Hampshire primary handily nearly three months ago, but state GOP officials are pushing a plan to block all of Trump's delegates from serving on any of the key committees at the national convention in July. Instead, the coveted convention slots would go entirely to delegates assigned to Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, John Kasich and Ted Cruz, even though Trump won 35 percent of the vote, more than double his closest competitor." -- CW
There are scores of recent migrants inside our borders charged with terrorism. For every case known to the public, there are dozens and dozens more. We must stop importing extremism through senseless immigration policies. -- Donald Trump, foreign policy address, April 27
Trump gave a prepared speech for once, with even a teleprompter. So one would presume that someone would have looked this stuff up before writing it into his speech. Alas, there is no evidence that 'scores' of 'recent migrants' are charged with terrorism, and that for every case made public, there are 'dozens and dozens more. -- Michelle Lee, Washington Post
Rebecca Savransky of the Hill: "Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on Sunday criticized Donald Trump's foreign policy after the Republican presidential front-runner outlined his 'America first' model. 'I think, based on the speech, you'd have somebody who doesn't understand the difference between a business negotiation and a negotiation with sovereign powers,' Gates said on ABC's 'This Week.'" -- CW
** Ripe for Tyranny? Andrew Sullivan of New York: "Could it be that the Donald has emerged from the populist circuses of pro wrestling and New York City tabloids, via reality television and Twitter, to prove not just Plato but also James Madison right, that democracies 'have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention ... and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths'?" --safari ...
... CW: See also discussion in today's Comments.
Lauren Collins of the New Yorker: "The temptation is to dismiss Melania [Trump] as a dummy, a compliant figure remarkable less for her personality than for her proportions.... If we take the office of First Lady seriously, then it's worth trying to figure out who Melania is as a person, versus a product to be placed." --safari
Trump the Boomer. Stephen Metcalf of Slate: "I think we can trace Trump's political instinct to a less personal, more sociological source. In this we need only look to his birth certificate. There we see that Donald John Trump was born on June 14, 1946. Is it possible Trumpismo, in its disdain for norms of speech and conduct, in its underlying craving for apocalyptic violence, is traceable to one simple fact? In almost plain sight, beneath the worldly swagger and breathtaking arrogance, lies Donald Trump the baby boomer." --safari
Olivier Laughland & Mae Ryan of the Guardian: "Although Trump has touted himself as 'the greatest jobs president that God has ever created', these workers [at Trump's Las Vegas hotel] point to the fact they are paid on average $3 less than the thousands of unionised hotel workers in Las Vegas who work identical jobs and enjoy a host of other benefits, including pensions and free health insurance, not available to Trump employees....Workers argue they have been subjected to surveillance, intimidation, and unlawful dismissal as they have sought to organize." --safari
Indiana -- #NeverTrump's Last Gasp. Chas Danner of New York: "A new NBC News/WSJ/Marist poll shows Donald Trump beating Ted Cruz by 15 points in Indiana, where the vote on Tuesday is seen by many as the actual last opportunity to halt Trump's first-ballot nomination in Cleveland....Cruz's 'Hail Carly' -- as USA Today deftly characterized the candidate's sudden choice of Carly Fiorina as a running mate last week -- has apparently had only a modest impact on Cruz's poll numbers. In the meantime, Cruz himself continues to profess his belief in an outcome which, so far, projections do not support... Appearing on ABC's This Week on Sunday, Cruz again insisted that 'it is going to be a contested convention' -- though he and his staff seem to have also acknowledged that if Trump wins Indiana, his nomination will be impossible to block." -- CW
He's been winning the women's vote in state after state. Ted is an immigrant. He is Hispanic. He can unify this party. -- Heidi Cruz, in Indiana Saturday
Dave Weigel: "Donald Trump returned to one of his favorite subjects, the Canadian birth of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), at an afternoon rally inside the city's largest sports arena. His cue came from the senator's wife, Heidi, who tripped over a word at a Saturday GOP presidential campaign rally and appeared to say that her husband was an immigrant. 'Heidi Cruz -- nice woman,' Trump began. 'She said this one: "My husband's an immigrant!" He's an immigrant! That's what I've been trying to say!'" -- CW
Jeremy Peters of the New York Times: "... as the gravitational pull of [Donald] Trump's recent primary landslides draws more Republicans toward him, [Ted] Cruz's support among the party's 2,472 convention delegates is softening, threatening his hopes of preventing Mr. Trump's nomination by overtaking him in a floor fight." -- CW
Joanna Walters & Alan Yujas of the Guardian: "Ted Cruz made a last-ditch series of attacks on Donald Trump on Sunday, going so far as to call him corrupt, dismiss fellow Republicans, and invoke Trump's endorsement by 'a convicted rapist'.... Cruz blitzed television airwaves on Sunday morning.... He accused Trump and [Hillary] Clinton of being agents of a corrupt system. 'They've both gotten rich exploiting Washington, exploiting government power,' he said on NBC's Meet the Press. On two other shows, he called the pair 'enmeshed in corruption', 'ultimate Washington insiders' and members of a political 'cartel'." The "convicted rapist" is Mike Tyson, whose endorsement Trump touted last week in Indiana -- the state where Tyson committed the crime. -- CW ...
... Watch sack o'shit Ted Cruz lie to a severely disabled man & his family about ObamaCare. Twice. In 30 seconds. -- CW Via Tommy Christopher of Mediaite.
Marc Caputo of Politico: "Marco Rubio won't be endorsing Ted Cruz during the Republican presidential primary, but he's likely to back the Texas senator at a contested convention -- if it gets that far. The de facto plan, Rubio's backers say, is designed to help Cruz. It also, however, protects Rubio's political future, including if he decides to make another run for the White House." CW: Because it's All About Marco.
Beyond the Beltway
Seattle Times: "Hurling rocks, bricks and even Molotov cocktails, anti-capitalist protesters clashed with police in downtown Seattle Sunday, as May Day mayhem erupted again following a peaceful march. By 10:30 p.m., at least five officers had been injured and at least nine people had been arrested, Seattle police reported. One injured officer suffered a gash to his head when he was struck by a rock." -- CW
Annie Ramos & Catherine Shoichet of CNN: "The first U.S. cruise ship bound for Cuba in decades set sail Sunday as salsa music played and protesters picketed nearby."
Michelle Kaske, et al., of Bloomberg: "Puerto Rico will default on a $422 million bond payment for its Government Development Bank, escalating what is turning into the biggest crisis ever in the $3.7 trillion market that U.S. state and local entities use to access financing." -- CW
Alene Tchekmedyian & Cindy Chang of the Los Angeles Times: "A top Los Angeles County sheriff's official has resigned amid mounting criticism over emails he sent mocking Muslims, blacks, Latinos, women and others from his work account during his previous job with the Burbank Police Department, the Sheriff's Department announced Sunday. After previously saying that he had no immediate plans to discipline his chief of staff, Sheriff Jim McDonnell said in a statement that he had accepted Tom Angel's resignation and intended to turn the controversy into a 'learning opportunity' for his department employees." CW: Right. Because he & his staff had no idea demeaning women & minorities wasn't A-OK. ...
... Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "Judge Shira A. Scheindlin, who in 2013 ruled that New York City's stop-and-frisk policy had violated the rights of minorities, said Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg [& Police Commissioner Michael Kelly] 'really never appreciated what was wrong' with the Police Department's procedure." CW: Too bad Bloomberg & Kelly didn't treat the ruling as a "learning opportunity." Because they have no idea that being stopped by a cop & subjected to a patdown for Walking While Black isn't A-OK.
A number of people ... stated that during the course of being stopped by the NYPD they were inappropriately touched, sexually harassed, and/ or sexually assaulted. Several interviewees described having their genitals touched or groped by the NYPD during searches and/or were told or forced by the NYPD to remove their clothes in public. Speaking out against inappropriate touching can lead to a charge of resisting arrest. These experiences often leave people feeling disrespected and violated. As one individual described, 'It made me feel violated, humiliated, harassed, shameful, and of course very scared.' -- Report, Center for Constitutional Rights, 2012
... CW P.S. If Tom Friedman & the rest of the Bloomberg for President Cheerleading Squad want to know what this man should never be president, Judge Scheindlin just gave them part of the answer: he "just doesn't get it."
Screw the People. CW: My excellent governor, Rick Scott (R-Crook), is off in California, trying to convince California companies to move to Florida because the minimum wage here is so low. He also says he's trying to get individuals to move to Florida because they "can't afford" to live in California. Yo, Rick, they can't afford to live in Florida, if they need to work.
Chelsea Manning in the Guardian: "[S]olitary confinement in the US is arbitrary, abused and unnecessary in many situations. It is cruel, degrading and inhumane, and is effectively a 'no touch' torture. We should end the practice quickly and completely.... Unfortunately, conditions similar to the ones I experienced in 2010-11 are hardly unusual for the estimated 80,000 to 100,000 inmates held in these conditions across the US every day." -- safari
Way Beyond
Paul Krugman: EU countries are still in bad economic shape because Europe's political leaders have no idea how macroeconomics work.
Michelle Kaske, et al., of Bloomberg: "Puerto Rico will default on a $422 million bond payment for its Government Development Bank, escalating what is turning into the biggest crisis ever in the $3.7 trillion market that U.S. state and local entities use to access financing." --safari
Loveday Morris of the Washington Post: "Supporters of Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr announced their withdrawal from Baghdad's fortified Green Zone on Sunday, packing up and leaving just a day after they stormed parliament and began a sit-in. Addressing the demonstrators, Akhlas al-Obaidi, a protest organizer, urged people to go home to give political decision-making a chance...." -- CW
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Reader Comments (17)
I hope this is only me with a left field imagination, but I cringed at the Obama "Trudge up the Hill" slogan. Seeing no alarmed views on it, I let it go. Now that I've slept on it, I am back to alarmed. My first reaction was "He surely didn't mean to do that!". It will be a gift to the trump machine, for which nothing is too low. To me it's also got sexist overtones (only me?), and was a bit too humiliating. I can see trump making so much of it from every angle. It's not going to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, but, why oh why? Unlike the Woman's Card, I see no way of spinning that to a positive.
@Gloria, Vox takes the different spin: Obama’s "Trudge up the Hill" joke wasn’t really about Hillary.: " It was a Bernie Sanders dig "
"...the overall approach is the same one Obama used; she's just been dealt worse cards. Obama's joke, silly as it was, was a recognition that they're on the same page here, that he recognizes she has the temperament for this thankless task, a steadfastness of heart which can brave even the crumbling of all hopes. And it's an implicit admonishment of Sanders for not recognizing these realities..
Last night was a missed opportunity for Larry Wilmore. I watch his show on occasion, and usually find at least one interesting observation per show.
Making jokes about the candidates is old hat at this point. The real object for lampooning should have been the press itself. Can you imagine a full-bore skewering a la Colbert in 2006, directed at the stenographers and relating their behavior to the fact-free mess we have today? There are even bright spots that would have been fodder as well, like Candy Crowley and "Please proceed, Governor."
President Obama made several good jabs at the subject, but the floor was wide open for Mr. Wilmore. Coulda woulda shoulda.
@MAG: I had read Dylan Matthews' take earlier, but I didn't link it, largely because I didn't buy it. While I acknowledge it's a possible reading, I put Obama's joke in the context of Joe Biden's recent criticism of Hillary for running a "No, We Can't" campaign.
In general, as Matthews concluded in the piece he co-wrote with Ezra Klein (linked above), Obama wasn't kidding about the so-called jokes. I suspect the POTUS agrees with the VPOTUS on this.
Marie
P.S. I regularly link opinion pieces I disagree with if they have some plausible point, but I didn't think Matthews' analysis was quite "plausible enough" to make the cut.
@Nisky Guy: Wilmore did criticize the press, but he wasn't funny about it, IMO. He just insulted everybody.
Marie
Thanks, @MAG, the Matthews article puts the best spin possible on the line, but not enough imo. I think the slogan is open to less intellectual interpretations, and my heart sinks when I see it. Hopefully I'm alone, and the trumpoids won't notice. Obama has a lot of campaigning to do to make up for this one. Or will Clinton not want this kind of help?
Democracies end: " when they are too democratic. " Andrew Sullivan writes over on New York mag. Read this at 2:30 am, and kept running it over and over in my mind ever since. Sullivan usually gets a lot of flack (often from Charlie Pierce, as I recall), but he does present an interesting POV here.
Then, over my first cup of coffee around 5am, I find Marie over on Krugman with this: "...Democracy is a crapshoot where the charlatans always weight the dice.
Back to "Trudge Up The Hill"...I wouldn't be surprised to learn that it has been a running one-line joke among certain insiders for some time. (And not the funniest thing at that). But saying it publicly at the WHCD likely won't make that much difference between now and election time. The GOP is much too addicted to Benghazi-Benghazzzzzzi, e-mails, and old Bill to find new bones to chew on.
@MAG: And one of those charlatans is the insufferable Andrew Sullivan. I didn't get much past his selective reading of a portion of "The Republic." Plato's "democracy" is essentially communism: that is, everything is owned in common & the dunderhead is "as equal" and the slave "as free" as the philosopher (which is Plato's big objection!).
Nor does Sullivan bother to mention that in Plato's view, this democracy/communist state is the reaction to oligarchy -- the condition in which we now find our country.
What Sullivan (& Plato!) do seem to get right is the characterization of Trump the Tyrant.
Anyway, nice to see that New York Mag now has its very own David Brooks.
Marie
Discussing Plato, democracy and everything, you might enjoy this old article by Dr Popper.
When I first saw the "Trudge Up the Hill" I interpreted it as the struggle Hillary has experienced, will experience, and did not think it was anything more than that. On second viewing I read something more into the "Up" rather than falling down–– the hill (Hillary)–-in other words Hillary is gaining rather than losing, but in gaining she will still need to keep pushing (or trudging). I thought Obama's jokes (read digs) directed at Bernie––hurt that Bernie has been so distant––"is that a way to treat a COMRADE?" and the sardonic tone when he said "Feel the Burn" clearly indicates this was not a billet-doux to Bernie. And after reading Matthews I tend to agree with his assessment.
When I first heard Obama rousing up a hopeful crowd with his "There are only the United States of America" speech I remember laughing. We have never had a state of unification but isn't it pretty to think so. Obama no longer thinks so and admits his naiveté ––his rock got stuck midway up his hill and it's still waiting to be nudged a little more. I'm just grateful that he got that far.
So how's about "UpHILL, all the way!" A bit snappier, perhaps...unfortunately, still open to twists and interpretation. Words, they're so confusing at times!
@Marie: Our Governor Malloy, here in CT., is trying to cut budgets big time including raising taxes on corporations and fat cats. He's getting a lot of push back not only from Republicans but from his own Democratic party. There have been several one percenters (there are so many in this state) that are threatening to leave if their taxes are raised and will migrate to Florida or so they say. Maybe on his way back from California Ricky can stop here in the Nutmeg state and gather a few more nuts to crack before he heads home to sunshine and poor people. "Let them eat oranges!" Scott screams.
@PD Pepe: Obama never thought there was "one America." That was an aspirational speech, not a statement of fact. No black person in the U.S. could possibly think there weren't red states & blue states.
He did, however, think Republicans would respect the presidency. And that did turn out to be more naive than most of us would have guessed.
Marie
"Obama has always had a healthy understanding of the reaction he elicits in others, and he learned to use it to his advantage a very long time ago. Marty Nesbitt remembers Obama’s utter calm the day he gave his celebrated speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, in Boston, which made him an international celebrity and a potential 2008 Presidential candidate. “We were walking down the street late in the afternoon,” Nesbitt told me. “And this crowd was building behind us, like it was Tiger Woods at the Masters.”
“Barack, man, you’re like a rock star,” Nesbitt said.
“Yeah, if you think it’s bad today, wait until tomorrow,” Obama replied.
“What do you mean?”
“My speech,” Obama said, “is pretty good.”
From Ryan Lizza––New Yorker-2008
Searching for that lost shaker of salt...
Punditry, as a going concern, has, it seems to me, several tracks one could follow. First, of course, is getting on TV and never shutting up, but that's a given. One can decide to be somewhat of a centrist, a wind-up, outer limits crank, or be that semi-dangerous seeming "unpredictable" sort.
Unpredictable however can refer to several things, one of which is a disconnection from any real passion. It can be this, it can be that. Whatever. Whatever gets me on TV is cool. As long as I say something against the grain, something to piss certain people off, it's all good. To be sure, I want to at least sound as if I have a working intellect in good (enough) order, no shorts in the wiring, no visible leaking fluids and a certain je na sais quoi stylisticky thingy going on.
And it's with an understanding (if not appreciation) of the punditry game that I came across a piece by every winger's favorite "liberal", Michael Kinsley. Over the years I've read some Kinsley opinions I've agreed with, but he's not the sort of liberal I'd want to find myself in a foxhole with. Rather than battle it out to the bitter end, I might turn around to find that he'd decided, overnight, that we could be overrun by Confederates, switched sides, and was now getting ready to shoot me. Sorry. Not my kinda liberal. Not my kinda man, frankly.
And back when TV punditry was really taking off, during the Dark Ages (the ascendancy of St. Ronnie), and for years after, Kinsley would appear on some show or other as the ostensible "liberal" usually facing some fire-breathing, true believer, lying wingnut asshole who would routinely give Kinsley the kind of beating reserved for someone who tried to take bread away from your kids. He seemed to miss every opportunity to attack the most obvious holes in his opponents' arguments and instead tried to be cute and likable. And too often, he would fucking AGREE with the mouth breathers!
But then you have to recall that Kinsley was part of the crew Marty Peretz had put together at the New Republic during the Dark Ages. Now most of you probably remember that TNR was a good magazine at one point. I don't just mean that it was knee jerk liberal. Christ, I'm not a knee jerk liberal. Suddenly, however, they were jumping into bed with the Reagan people, touting their worst excesses as a much needed breath of fresh air. Soon we had wingers like Fred Barnes and Charles fucking Krauthammer (who used to call himself a "thinking liberal"; well if Krauthammer is a liberal, someone must have chloroformed the people at Dictionary Central) started showing up with their neocon blather, trashing liberal concepts as the workings of pinko homosexual lovers, lazy minority coddlers, tree huggers, and out of touch losers. The same sorts of shit they're still saying.
And often, Kinsley would agree. Sort of. Whatever. If it made him sound a bit "dangerous" he'd do it.
So what's he up to know that has me so worked up?
He's saying that liberals are all wrong about Citizens United, that it's a great decision and we should all just shut up about it. His argument is so sophomoric that I won't bother to repeat it in detail (you can read it here). I was, in fact, prepared to dissect it point by point, but that's not really necessary.
In a very small nutshell, he claims that money IS speech and corporations ARE people. And then sniffs that if we want to fix it, we should just try to work harder (sounds like Jeb!) and be good boys and girls, and, oh yeah, if it really is a bad idea, well, time will tell and it will all come out in the wash. He also goes out of his way to wag his finger at liberals who hold in high regard the free speech aspect of the First Amendment and chastises anyone who disagrees with Citizens United because it guarantees speech they might not like.
But this is a bit of a giveway, isn't it? If CU guaranteed that speech from all sides would be equally considered, who could argue with that? But it doesn't and he knows this.
And what he never mentions is that much of the "speech" guaranteed by CU is anonymous. We never get to find out who is "talking". Not to mention the fact that unleashing unrestricted money into politics has a naturally corrupting influence in ways not easily measured. But isn't that the point? Wasn't that what the CU supporters were looking for? Kinsley sniffs that money doesn't buy election victory and he gives a single example. And it's true that even the Kochs have given up (so they say) trying to buy a president this time around, but that doesn't mean they aren't buying loads of down ballot victories. They have and they are and they will. Because they can.
Kinsley also tries to claim that CU opponents are blaming the flood of unrestricted "speech" for Donald Trump. I'm not. Are you? In fact I haven't heard that particular complaint from any reasonable, thoughtful liberal source. No one thinks that, but it's a nice straw man for Kinsley to kick over.
No. Citizens United's influence and effect is much more insidious than that. Dark money plays a much more effective role in creating the conditions for certain types of politicians to gain power. They don't have to be "bought", they come pre-owned.
But Kinsley is still thought of as a responsible voice and someone with carefully considered opinions. Like so many other opinionaters, his require very large grains of salt. And like Little Johnny and the Dwarfs, his opinion about Citizens United is sanctimonious and willfully--wildly--bereft of an appreciation for how things work in the real world.
I don't always agree with Krugman, for instance, but at least he and commentators like Rachel Maddow bring a nice combination of passion, facts, and critical thought to the discussion.
Kinsley brings shrink-wrapped baloney straight off the boat from Pundititaville.
Pass the salt.
@AK: In TNR's 100 yr. anniversary issue in 2014 before the fall and all (or most) of the good writers had left we subscribers were treated to a fat copy with really good pieces by 22 writers of distinction but nary was Michael Kingsley among them. He was, however, included in "Our Best Sentences" page:
" 'A gaffe' is the opposite of a 'lie': it is when a politician inadvertently tells the truth."
Obama: "Bernie's slogan has helped his campaign catch fire among the young people.
Hillary's slogan has just not had the same effect (slide)"
How you read that as pro Hillary and not a criticism of her 'flat' campaign is beyond me esp as he follows up with "Hillary trying to appeal to young people is a little bit like your relative just signed up for Facebook......aunt Hillary.
Considering that Obama stated earlier that"If this material works well I'm going to use it at Goldman Sachs next year....." If he was more critical of Hillary we wouldn't have needed Wilmore.